25 words or fewer:The Magic travel to Minnesota to face a Timberwolves team that has yet to win a game this season.
Know your enemy: The 'Wolves remained competitive with the Knicks on Sunday, but wound up losing 97-93. Newly-acquired Antoine Walker missed what would have been the game-tying three-pointer for Minnesota. Zach Randolph hit a free throw to secure the final margin.
Useless information: Only five players from last year's Wolves team -- Randy Foye, Marko Jaric, Rashad McCants, Mark Madsen, and Craig Smith -- remain on this year's squad.
Bullet points:
- Tonight's game is on Sun Sports, so Bright House customers in Orlando should be able to see it.
- Here's an old Bill Simmons column in which the Sports Guy argues that Al Jefferson is better than Dwight Howard. Question: had Jefferson played for Minnesota last season, instead of for Simmons' native Boston, would Simmons have taken up this fight?
- Rumor has it that Michael Doleac, whom the Timberwolves recently acquired from Miami in the Ricky Davis trade, may end up playing for the Magic this season.
- I'd like to forget this overtime loss to the Timberwolves from last season, but I just cant. Trailing by one point in the last few seconds of overtime, Jameer Nelson drives into the lane, floats up a shot... and has it swatted by Kevin Garnett. Hey, I like Jameer, but shouldn't he have known that Ticket was gonna be there to reject that shot? Ugly.
- In two games against Minnesota last season, Rashard Lewis averaged 28.5 points on 37.5% shooting. He's been a dead-eye shooter so far this season -- 56% shooting from a wing player?! -- so let's hope he doesn't revert back to his less-than-accurate ways.
- I really dig this Timberwolves blog. How the heck did they get the 'Wolves' jersey font onto their computer? As the late Mitch Hedberg might have said, "That's f---in' magical." No pun intended
Pre-game, in-game, and post-game comments go here. As usual, I'll have a wrap-up posted shortly after the conclusion of the game.